Reviews and Comments

This book is a good time. I listened to the audiobook and the narrator was generally good, the exception being the choice to attempt accents for all characters in the book which led to some pretty problematic portrayals. This is sort of handwaved away by constantly reminding the reader that Ryland Grace is a "cool" white guy, including many quips where he accuses the no-no sense Stratt of various types of discrimination.

The most enjoyable part of this story is the science. This book is fun to read for the same reason that many childrens' fantasy stories are fun to read—all the scenes are, fundamentally, mysteries. It is genuinely satisfying to see a scientific problem being slowly described and come to the right conclusion just before Grace does in the story. That happens a lot, however, so if that small burst of satisfaction at "cracking the case" isn't for you, this book will be a long and dreary read. There are many, many scenes that, if plot were the only concerns, could be cut entirely from the book without losing anything of substance.

Regarding the plot, it's a fun concept connected by lots of assumptions. If you can buy that those assumptions make sense, the story will be entertaining to you, but I found many of these assumptions so outlandish it diminished the story. The entire world unanimously agrees to give Stratt, who has a degree in history, the ability to do whatever she wants and break any and all earth laws and control the most powerful militaries of the world? A public school science teacher with no formal astronaut training or history of government service is third in line to go on a mission that will doom or save all of humanity? Humans collectively agree to engage in widespread biosphere destruction on a scale never before witnessed by Earth and not a single state or terrorist group or other rogue actor is able to mount a competent defense?

Yeah. It takes a lot of handwavium to get through it. The single biggest detraction from the story in my opinion is the infantilization of Grace. He even jokes about it early on when he opts to say "fudge" instead of "fuck," but it gets downright annoying by the halfway point that this character is seemingly incapable of expressing true emotions about anything, including expanding his vocabulary to include words that are beyond what middle school children would use.

Aside from those issues I did enjoy the book. It is overwhelmingly optimistic with the "best case" ending, so if you're expecting any tear jerking you won't get it here. Character development is paper thin, but the plot is interesting enough to keep your attention.

This book is not very good. I have been listening to the audiobook and, in spite of its short duration, I can't bring myself to finish it. The book is definitely creepy, but I hesitate to call it scary. Simply put, the book is almost entirely devoid of action. I like psychological terror as much as the next guy, but something like the first quarter to third of the book is spent following around the point of view character prior to her arrival at the house. We learn some important details about her personality during this time, but I couldn't help but think you could cut all that chaff out of the book and still be left with the wheat of the story—unfortunately, the wheat is lacking.

The characters spend more time describing in a very empirical and scientific way how they are feeling and reacting to the strangeness of the house than they do actually reacting in any realistic human way. This perhaps fits the premise of the "science experiment" aspect of their staying in the house, but it completely sucks the terror out of every remotely terrifying moment. It reads like a textbook.

Maybe if I were reading this book at 2AM on a moonless Halloween night during a thunderstorm my reaction would be different. It's just not for me.